hawk in my yard

[cowdogcadillac]

came home to let my puppies out into the backyard ,opened sliding glass doors to find a hawk on top of my best chicken. My little Polish girl "Tiny Turner".
It must have just happened moments ago because i spooked it away and she has only a talon puncture a half inch below her right eye. She's up and walking but discombobulated. Cleaned the wound and waiting for her to drink. Hope she makes it thru the night. She isn't usually allowed out with the other birds since she cant see well with the mop top.Lucky for federal protection,because that hawk flew 60 yards away into a tree and watched me waiting for me to walk away from Tiny turner. I'd have greased her otherwise.,,,,that is otherwise,,I'm not saying I'm going to so no need for preaching on posting about killing hawks.

Just a bad day.

 

[loverOFchickens]

WOW. It sounds like a really bad day. I have a dog that runs loose with the birds and even though we have tons of hawks we haven't had a problem yet.
I always feel sad when I see a post about a hawk getting at people's birds. At least you caught it before major damage was done.

 

[kla37]

I really hope she is OK!

 

[Harriet&Lucy]

I can sooo relate to your fury toward the hawk. I had one chase a chicken right into the coop. I arrived home just then, and it flew off, so it didn't even get a meal out of my girl. That may have made me the maddest. Broke my heart for nothing.

 

[Happy Chooks]

I hope your girl is okay.

 

[cowdogcadillac]

just about 10 pm and she's alive and wound looks good. She was alert to the flashlight. I'm going to re name her lucky if she makes it thru this. First my puppies almost killed her,then something broke into the coop and ate her brother while she was there, and now this. She should buy a little lottery ticket with her luck.

 

[Harriet&Lucy]

How is Tiny this morning? Hoping for the best.

 

[cowdogcadillac]

Still alive this morning. I think she has lost sight in the right eye from the attack. Not sure yet,,it's swollen pretty good, and glassy. No more free ranging for her.

 

[kla37]

I hope she pulls through! My chickens are 19 weeks old, and haven't been free yet. I'm just so terrified of that exact thing happening. They have a nice big roofed run, and I'm afraid they will get bored, but I'm more afraid they'll get eaten!

 

[Schultz]

I'm glad she is ok! We just had a similar thing happen not too long ago. I was doing my daily chicken chores one Sat. morning and had our little special needs MF D'uccle (Wheatie) out with me while I was filling waterers. It was very hot that day so I went in to get a drink. Something caught my interest on the morning news so I paused to watch it. My wife heard a ruckous coming from the main layer run and went out to investigate and there was a hawk on top of Wheatie. She took off running at them and scared the hawk off. The hawk had pinned her face down in the dirt and luckily that was all that happened to her. We inspected her all over and no wounds of any kind were found! Thank God my wife heard the commotion because I didn't. I can't stand hawks. They have been a big problem for us this year and this has been the first year that we haven't let our chickens or turkeys out to free range unless we are right there with them.
Now in my own opinion, my dime, my time, and my opinion, I don't think that the law should apply to us when we are only protecting our flocks! There should not be anything keeping us from taking out those stinkin' terrorists from the sky. We all put too much time and way too much money into our flocks just to have Big Brother tell us we can't protect them. And wouldn't you know it? They always seem to go after our favorites!